Why China’s rise needs to be taken with a pinch of salt

Why China’s rise needs to be taken with a pinch of salt

Wed, September 9, 2026 at 8:15 PM GMT+3 2 min read

A closer look at the numbers that paint China as accelerating towards global biopharma dominance and you will find indications that the region's ascension is not as unassailable as many might think.

This was the message a panel of pharma representatives and analysts gave at the 2026 Nordic Life Science Days meeting in Stockholm, Sweden, 9 September. They note that while China has capitalised on its newfound innovation with more robust asset quality and intellectual property protection in recent years, there are reasons to believe the Asian giant's course could be reaching a plateau.

China has emerged has a key destination in which Western pharma companies have ventured to in search of pipeline bolstering. Licensing deals between US and Chinese biopharma companies hit record highs in 2024, a 280% increase from 2020, according to analysis by GlobalData. While data is still being compiled for 2025, that trend looks to have continued. However, given expansive in-house R&D capabilities at many US and European pharma companies, drugs developed in China still account for small portions of their pipelines.

Panellists discussed what lies ahead for China's role in the global pharma industry. Daniel Rankin, head of strategy and corporate development at SOBI, says there is now an oversupply of Chinese drugs. With swathes of China's industry focused on rapidly improving on new drugs out of the US and Europe, he says there are now many mechanistically similar candidates that will struggle to find buyers overseas.

This view concurs with a sentiment voiced by experts who were interviewed by Pharmaceutical Technology at the end of 2025. They suggested that the pool of assets has been drained through high-deal turnover, which in turn would lead to a slowing in the future.

A slowdown in dealmaking may also be tied, counterintuitively, to higher quality Chinese candidates. According to Frances Stocks Allen, a partner at Cooley, "people aren't really going to China for a bargain anymore. The Chinese prices have remarkable increased." She adds, "demand clearly will slow down as it becomes apparent that there's not going to be quite so many buyers at this higher price point."

Other regions in Asia are now likely the next to see rapid expansion in the market, says Malin Jonsson Boezelman, senior director of business development at AstraZeneca. In particular, Rankin identifies India. She says that while India may not be able to match its neighbour's speed and scale of innovation, the country has the "intellectual muscle" to fuel a future rise akin to China's in the past.

"Why China's rise needs to be taken with a pinch of salt" was originally created and published by Pharmaceutical Technology, a GlobalData owned brand.